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The Same All Over
"The Same All Over" was a brief Special Comment delivered during the third Current TV edition of Countdown with Keith Olbermann, airing on 23 June 2011. The Comment As promised, on this, a brief Comment tonight over same-sex marriage and the tipping-point for or against, represented by events here in New York State. The tipping-point of course is temporary. Every year, the margin by which the country supports this grows, and within a decade or perhaps less, it will be universal in this nation. Period. Ironically, this is not because there is great advocacy for it, but simply out of an inability of younger people in this country to do what older ones still can. To pretend that this matters anymore. It just doesn't. It won't destroy the Democracy. It doesn't destroy the family. It strengthens the institution of marriage in its principle premise of fidelity. And it increases the number of people living in stable and loving homes. And the more that modern life allows us to interact with others of different faiths and professions and interests and origins, the more we understand that people are fundamentally the same all over. Good and bad. And if you want to categorize people, you should categorize them on their honesty, their sincerity, their generosity. But a curious thing is happening to the forces still opposed to same-sex marriage: they are getting desperate. There was a protestor in the New York capital of Albany this week who explained this was all about the children. That these same-sex families had kids who were exposed to things they should never face anywhere, let alone at home. Oops. If you want to open up the Pandora's Box of judging whether people should be permitted to marry based on their qualifications to be parents, I'm afraid there are only going to be about 43 weddings per year in this country, because the list of risks to children created by their parents is nightmarishly long. And standing there being all gay around them is probably no higher than No. 206. If the opponents of same-sex marriage want to take this perilous route, they are likely only to hasten same-sex marriage in all fifty states, and to merely bloody themselves in the process. Because sooner rather than later, the euphemisms and the façades -- especially this one about raising children -- will fall away, and the opponents will be revealed to be carrying water for a larger kind of orthodoxy. Their church is opposed to same-sex marriage, because same-sex marriage means diversity. And diversity means peaceful interaction between members of different groups and religions. And peaceful interaction means fears and prejudices are diminished, and the diminishing means that those churches cartel in the religion business is jeopardized. I'm not talking belief or faith here. Your belief and your faith, provided you do not hurt anybody else with it, is your business, and I defend you. But if you think Big League Religions are only about faith and not at all about business, or about keeping people scared, then you have not been paying attention, in church or out. And there is an even bigger issue. There is an ever-growing acceptance of what I said about this nearly three ago after the hateful Prop-8 was passed in California. This is -- corny as it seems -- not about politics, or religions, or power, or lobbying. It is about love. "In a time of impermanence and fly-by-night relationships, these people over here want the same chance at permanence and happiness that is" already yours. "They don't want to deny you yours. They don't want to take anything away from you. They want what you want: a chance to be a little less alone in the world." And your acceptance of their love turns out to be your own expression of love to your fellow human being. As in 2008, the poetry of the 11th Century Persian Omar Khayyám tells this story best. I recommend it to anybody still holding out on this, whether they be pedestrian or President. :So I be written in the Book of Love. :I do not care about that Book above. :Erase my name, or write it as you will. :So I be written in the Book of Love. Video * "The Same All Over" See Also Same All Over Same All Over Same All Over Same All Over